


Make your soul crawl out of its hiding place

by GirlonaBridge



Category: The Bletchley Circle, The Bletchley Circle: San Francisco (TV)
Genre: Alcohol, F/F, implied one-sided Jean/Millie
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-29
Updated: 2018-08-29
Packaged: 2019-07-04 07:51:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,871
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15836967
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GirlonaBridge/pseuds/GirlonaBridge
Summary: To one who is used to drinking Scotch, Bourbon is an acquired taste. Hailey and Jean drink whiskey and grow closer.





	Make your soul crawl out of its hiding place

‘What the hell is this?’

The first time Jean McBrian tastes bourbon her face is an absolute picture.

‘It’s whiskey.’ Hailey is stumped. Jean asked for whiskey so she ordered whiskey and that’s what they’ve got. She takes another mouthful of her own drink to double check. Yup. Definitely whiskey. And not bad stuff. But Jean’s face is screwed up like she’s just drunk cow piss by mistake.

‘Good grief that’s awful.’

Hailey stares. Maybe she has fallen foul of someone’s cow piss trick after all. She can’t think how, in this city bar that feels a hundred miles from the sort of back sticks farm barn where that kind of trick gets played on unsuspecting visitors and young drinkers. But best be sure. She snatches up Jean’s glass and takes a wary sip.

‘Definitely whiskey.’ Hailey grins, relieved. Then she realises Jean is staring at her. ‘What?’

For a long moment, Jean just gapes. It begins to dawn on Hailey that she maybe did something she oughtn’t to have. She shoves Jean’s glass back across the table to her.

‘Gee I’m sorry, I just thought…’ But there in her head is Sarge’s voice, suggesting that maybe she better not finish that sentence, that it’s all going to sound even more dumb-hick dopey out loud than it already does as it runs through her mind again. She flashes a brilliant smile instead, clutching her own glass. 

‘Cheers!’

After another long moment, and a long slug of her drink she notices that Jean still hasn’t touched her glass again.

‘You don’t like whiskey?’

Jean huffs what might be a British sort of a laugh. 

‘I like whisky dear. But what on earth is this stuff?’

‘It’s Bourbon.’ Hailey is still definitely confused.

‘Well it’s certainly not Scotch.’ Jean sniffs a general sniff of disapproval, then raises her glass and sniffs the offending amber liquid. Hailey watches her eyebrows raise further than anyone’s she has ever seen.

‘You don’t like it? I can get you something else if you want. I can finish that one for you.’ Hailey already has her hand outstretched when she sees Jean’s fingers tighten on the glass. 

‘That would be a criminal waste of alcohol,’ Jean says, primly. She assays another sip and barely grimaces this time. Hailey sits back in her chair with a knowing look that she doesn’t even attempt to hide. I’m on to you lady, she thinks.

She thinks the same thing again when she finds herself placing another order only five minutes later. 

‘Another two whiskies.’

Hailey had tried teasing, suggesting that perhaps Jean switch to something she might prefer, but Jean had insisted. ‘Even that muck is better than some wishy-washy drink.’ 

‘I think we deserve them,’ she adds when Hailey returns to the table. ‘After our little encounter.’ She tilts her glass to Hailey.

‘That was a pretty good fight you put up back there.’

‘I can handle myself.’ Hailey is too old to blush, but compliments always make her a little awkward.

‘I can see that.’ Jean’s eyes are appraising and suddenly Hailey wonders if she is too old for blushing after all, at the same moment as she realises that she really wants to be. She kicks back in her chair to try to play it cool.

‘A girl gets around, she has to learn to. I don’t know if you’ve exactly noticed but I’m not the sort that’s always kept polite company. Hell, before Sarge got a hold of me I never even heard of polite company.’ 

Jean sets her glass down and meets Hailey’s eyes.

‘I don’t know about polite but you’re good company to have in a tight corner.’ She is so quietly direct and sincere that Hailey has to break the moment, look away. 

‘Anyway. You’d have done the same for me.’

‘Well, not quite the same.’ Jean’s tone is wry. ‘I don’t think I’m up to your level of gymnastics.’ She smiles but there’s an edge of bitterness or regret or something that Hailey can’t stomach. 

‘You’d whack them with your stick or something then. You’re one tough cookie.’ This odd, fierce, British woman needs to know that, Hailey feels. She’s won Hailey’s respect and she isn’t even sure how, so quickly. But as sure as Hailey trusts her instincts on anything she knows she trusts Jean McBrian. And she wants to know a lot more about her. 

For her part, Jean is surprised by how much she is enjoying Hailey’s company. And not just because of her possibly having just saved her life, or least prevented another major injury. Her straightforward, no-nonsense approach is something Jean can appreciate. Though lord is she young, Jean thinks as Hailey offers to demonstrate some moves Jean could use with that stick to tackle any further attackers. 

‘I’ve never really thought of it as a weapon. Should remember that.’ Jean allows a quirk of her lips in the direction of a smile and pretends not to notice Hailey’s answering grin. She takes another sip of her drink, doesn’t wince this time but still gives it a disapproving glare when she sets it down before glancing at her wristwatch. 

‘We had better be heading back. See what Millie and Iris have found out.’

‘Ok.’ Hailey is on her feet in an instant. She snatches up her half-full glass and drains it in one gulp. ‘Ready when you are.’ She slaps the glass back down beside Jean’s. Jean looks from it to Hailey’s implacable face, utterly without guile. 

A bit of the devil comes into Jean then. She has never been able to resist a challenge. And there is something about Hailey that Jean finds is challenging her at every turn, although she doesn’t think the girl even realises it, all wide eyes and expectation that she is. Very calmly and smoothly Jean lifts her glass to her lips, tilts her head back and swallows the remaining whiskey. Her eyes on Hailey’s, she daintily licks her lips. 

‘Best make a move then.’

And stick or no stick she is halfway out of that bar before Hailey has recovered enough to chase after her. 

…

It is a golden evening, the one they spend in the veterans’ bar, the night they see everyone responsible for the “holy palms” murders arrested. It is the first time Jean thinks she has really relaxed since they arrived in San Francisco. If she really thinks about it, it’s the most relaxed she has felt in a long time. It is a charmed circle they create in the lamplight, circulating beers and whiskies, swapping stories, sharing laughter, warmth and safety swelling slowly as the satisfaction of a job-well-done sinks into their bones. If Jean catches Millie’s eye from time to time and her heart aches a little, it’s no more than she is used to. A little fresher pang perhaps but nothing she can’t handle. 

‘You seem to be getting used to that _dreadful stuff_.’ Jean finds Hailey beside her, speaking almost into her ear, as they leave the bar at long last. Jean laughs out loud at Hailey’s coarse attempt at an accent.

‘Is that supposed to be what I sound like?’ she chuckles.

‘Well…’ Hailey links her arm through Jean’s, tilting her head to consider. ‘You’re much scarier-sounding.’ 

‘Thanks for the compliment.’ Jean raises her eyebrows. She isn’t quite sure whether scarier-sounding is a good thing or not tonight. Usually she appreciates her ability to put the fear of God into anyone who crosses her path, but tonight she has felt softer, warmer, and she had thought that those in her inner circle knew her better than that. She sniffs reflexively. Silliness. She has only known Hailey and Iris a scant few days. Silliness to presume on the strength of their shared experiences in such a short time. She makes to withdraw her arm, but Hailey tucks her closer.

‘Ah ah ah! Admit it Jean. Bourbon ain’t so bad.’

There’s such warmth and animation in Hailey’s gentle teasing that is so at odds with her thoughts that Jean snaps her head around to look up at her.

‘Now don’t give me that schoolmarm look. It don’t work on me.’ 

‘Oh really?’ Despite herself, Jean finds herself relaxing into the other woman’s side. She purses her lips to conceal her smile. 

‘Besides, I’m gonna walk you to the car. It’s only right.’ Hailey’s tone brooks no argument and she looks straight ahead so that even when Jean eyes her sidelong, she cannot read her expression. They fall into a steady pace together. Ahead, Millie is regaling Iris with some tale which is obviously hilarious, judging by the subdued giggling coming from Iris and Millie’s expansive gestures and throaty chuckles. The gaps between streetlights turn them both to shadows then bathe them suddenly in light, turning Millie’s hair fiery and her figure all slopes and delicate curves. When they pause under a streetlamp for Millie to relight her cigarette and she tips her head back afterward to blow smoke in a steady stream, Jean doesn’t even realise that she sighs.

‘You ditched the stick,’ Hailey says softly. Her eyes follow Jean’s. 

‘Yes.’ 

Millie turns back and raises a hand to them. Jean nods in return.

‘I think it’s time I stopped using that old crutch and stood on my own two feet again.’

She tightens her fingers on Hailey’s arm briefly.

‘Come on. Don’t want to get left behind.’

…

‘I had my first kiss on a beach.’ Jean has no idea what makes her share that little secret from her ancient past. The peace of the evening, the lap of the water dredging up the old memory, the nostalgia of camp fire smoke.

‘What was she like?’ Hailey speaks around a mouthful of the stew that she is taste-testing, seeming more concerned with chasing a slurp of onion than in the response to her words. Jean stills as her stomach swoops, adjusting to the brazenness of this suggestion, this acceptance. Hailey knew. 

‘She…’ Jean stares at the fire. The night feels more real somehow, noises louder, the dusk more intense.

‘I haven’t thought about this in years,’ she admits. She hazards a glance sideways to find Hailey gazing up at her, eyes thoughtful and patient. Jean hasn’t talked about that moment in decades, hasn’t said any of these words out loud in longer than she can remember, but she finds she wants to, to meet that gentle expectancy in Hailey’s face, to tell her something. She just isn’t sure if she can. 

‘She… was very young. But then so was I.’ She looks out into the night, away down the beach. 

‘She didn’t speak to me for a week after.’ 

‘She came back though.’ Hailey sounds so confident, it isn’t even a question, and Jean realises that she was smiling at the memory. She has to concede with a nod, although she wonders how the hell this girl guessed.

Hailey leans sideways on the log, resting her elbow on her knee.

‘My first kiss sucker-punched me.’ Hailey pauses to take gulp of whiskey and Jean wonders at her matter-of-fact attitude. 

‘But she came right back for more the next day.’ Hailey grins conspiratorially. ‘So I figure I won out in the end.’

Jean throws her head back and laughs. Campfire smoke catches in the branches of the trees that fringe the beach. When Hailey offers her the bottle she doesn’t even hesitate.

…

‘I think that stuff is growing on you.’

Jean pulls a face but Hailey can see her heart isn’t in it.

‘It could be worse. Sweet but strong.’ She leans an inch closer, almost bumping Hailey’s shoulder, a glint in her eye. ‘Packs a punch.’ 

‘Why Jean McBrian, are you flirting with me?’ Hailey has wanted to say that most of the evening but she has just enough good food and whiskey in her for the words to bubble out.

Jean chuckles. There are worse reactions, Hailey thinks. She should know, she’s had them all. And the way Jean’s eyes crease up when she laughs is very attractive.

‘It has been a long time since someone asked me a question like that child.’

‘I’m not a child.’ 

‘No.’ Jean gives her a look that is contrite at first but, as Hailey holds her eye, holds her nerve, the look changes into something more.

‘No, you’re not. You’re a very attractive, thoughtful, energetic _young_ woman.’

Hailey leans back, stretches her feet towards the fire. If this is seriously Jean giving her the brush off because she doesn’t like her then she will take it, but not because of any silly out-fashioned notions of propriety or some wrong-headed assumptions about her. 

‘I’m not innocent. I rode the rails halfway across the country when I was 16 and before that I was raised on a farm. I probably knew more about the bulls and the heifers before you even heard tell of the birds and bees. And I’m thirty, I’ve grown up a lot since then.’

‘I don’t mean to be patronising,’ Jean says quietly. 

They stare at the fire together. Jean tilts the whiskey bottle into her glass again. The only sounds the whisper of waves and fire, the clink of glass and gentle glug of liquor. She stretches out to offer the bottle to Hailey. When Hailey reaches for it their fingers brush but neither says anything for a long moment.

When Hailey looks over her shoulder, Jean is smiling at her.

…

‘It's been a long time since anyone saw me take all my clothes off.’ Jean ploughs through the water smoothly, sliding her feet along the sand as she wades deeper. She locks her arms around her stomach, for modesty and warmth, knees already bending slightly to seek the privacy the water offers. Hailey kicks back in delight. 

‘Well you haven’t taken all your clothes off. Yet.’

‘Oi.’ Jean aims a deadly splash at her. ‘I don’t know what you might do but I don’t. Not on a first date.’ She finishes with an overdose of Scottish primness and sinks her shoulders below the water. Hailey feels herself pink all over at the idea that this is a date. She feigns nonchalance though, kicking her feet up and waggling her toes in Jean’s direction.

‘Oh I’d do anything. But I wouldn’t want to do anything to make you uncomfortable.’

‘I’m freezing my bits and pieces off in the Pacific Ocean in the middle of the night and you tell me you don’t want to make me uncomfortable.’ Jean barks a laugh. ‘I’ve got news for you dearie.’

‘You love it though.’ Hailey swings around until the water swirls between them, until they are almost, almost touching.

Jean laughs again, a little higher pitched, a little uncontrolled.

‘Swim harder’, Hailey urges, reaching out to give her shoulder a shove then swimming several strokes away, going deeper, further out.

Jean raises her eyes to the heavens for a moment, then gives in and joins her. She pulls hard through the dark water, legs kicking a little awkwardly at first then finding their rhythm, remembering their strength. She hasn’t swum in well over a decade, hasn’t been in the sea in far longer, but some things are bred in the bone. 

‘You’re good at this,’ Hailey says when she catches her up surprisingly quickly. The younger woman is pink and a little breathless, the ends of her hair trailing in the water, her grin undaunted and infectious.

They stand at the very edge of where they can put their feet down, toes just barely holding grip on the bottom, bobbing gently with the ebb of the water. It is fully dark now. Looking back at the beach, their camp fire and car lights seem a surprisingly long way away. Jean shivers. 

Hailey gulps and Jean can see her take her courage in both hands.

‘I can warm you up, you know.’ The line is visible from a mile off but it is still oddly charming, just like Hailey’s inimitable combination of awkward chivalry and blunt honesty. She drifts inches closer, looking directly at Jean now.

‘We’ll get hypothermia,’ Jean protests weakly but she doesn’t move for the shore.

‘Come on Jean, live a little.’ There’s that light in Hailey’s eyes, the same one that glinted there the moment before she started stripping to run into the water, the same one Jean has seen hints of at various moments over the two cases they have worked together. It’s a light Jean recognises intimately, has spent years tamping down in herself, firefighting in others, in reckless girls, in Claire, in Susan, in Millie most of all. It’s a spark that keeps flaring up in her at most inconvenient moments and now it catches. A challenge.

‘You’re not some girl from the ‘bur…’ Hailey is continuing her teasing when Jean surprises her into silence, cuts her off with a hand around her waist pulling them closer, so close together that the sea squeezes out from between them, bare flesh meets cool bare flesh and Hailey gasps.

‘I’m not.’ Jean breathes into the tiny gap between their faces, her voice more profoundly Scottish than Hailey has yet heard it. She finds herself shaking her head in the tiniest of motions until the movement becomes lips brushing against lips and she opens her mouth into Jean McBrian’s kiss. 

…

 

They dry off on the picnic blanket, taking it in turns to rub themselves vigorously, basking by the fire in between. 

‘You didn’t think to bring a towel then?’ Jean asks, as she turns herself from side to side, trying to get the heat of the flames to reach as much of her skin as possible. 

‘Nope.’ Hailey emerges from a swathe of blanket, grinning, hair all a mess. ‘Didn’t really plan this. Didn’t really plan any of it.’ Her eyes rake down Jean’s body in a way that makes her wrap her arms around herself tighter

‘I find that hard to believe.’ She tries to sound severe, but she can’t suppress a little thrill of pleasure at being desired so openly. 

‘Here.’ Hailey holds the blanket out wide. Jean reaches for it but finds herself enveloped in it instead, wrapped in Hailey’s arms. It’s strange, being held, but after a moment, she realises that it is not unpleasant. Hailey rubs her arms through the blanket and she is rough enough for it not be too cloying.

‘Better?’ 

Jean nods, suddenly not trusting herself to speak. She isn’t sure why. Hailey seems to understand at least and doesn’t push her. She gives her shoulders a final squeeze and steps away to the fire. Jean finds her place to sit on the log, huddles into the blanket and watches as Hailey tosses on a few more sticks of driftwood, hops from foot to foot as close as she can get, reaches her arms over the flames to warm them further. Jean can’t help watching how the firelight licks over her skin, turning it golden and shadowy, emphasising curves and planes and the length of her limbs. She is struck by how beautiful she looks in this moment. How long it has been since she saw a woman look this beautiful, this open, relaxed, for her. An image of Millie flickers into her mind, lamplit, bending low over a desk, red and gold in a dark night. But she flicks the image away. Millie doesn’t love her like that and she won’t make a sentimental old fool of herself. 

‘Hey Jean.’

Hailey is standing before her, two tin plates in her outstretched hands.

‘Want the rest of the stew?’

And all at once she realises she does, she is ravenous in fact. She takes the plate with enthusiastic agreement.

They rearrange themselves, Jean shifting down the log, offering the blanket to share. They end up wrapped in it together, pressed closer than before, arms and legs brushing occasionally as they wolf down the remainder of the fish stew. It somehow tastes even better than before, appetites sharpened by cold salt water and the energy simmering between them.

‘Ready to return to the real world?’ The softness of Hailey’s question surprises Jean into turning. She is not used to people considering her feelings this delicately. Hailey is watching her carefully, ready to read what she means beneath whatever it is she says. Jean feels more exposed than she has all evening, but she also feels a swell of affection for this girl… woman, who has gone to all this effort for her, and still isn’t taking anything for granted.

‘Almost,’ she murmurs. She lets her eyes do the beckoning, breathes in deeply and finds Hailey’s lips meet her own just as she reaches for her. 

It’s a sweet, slow, long kiss. And maybe it isn’t going anywhere right now, and maybe it doesn’t hold any promises because Jean isn’t ready to make any, but it holds potential, a suggestion, a maybe. Hailey draws back with starry eyes. Then she blinks, and her expression is once again practical.

‘Better get our duds on then.’ She stands and pokes about, grabbing up her discarded clothing. Then, to Jean’s utter consternation, she starts to strip off the few remaining items she is still wearing.

‘What?’ she gasps, staring, then snaps her head around, away.

‘Hailey.’ She tries to sound reasonable. ‘What are you doing?’

She can hear Hailey pause; the rustle of clothing stops. 

‘I’m not putting dry clothes on over wet underwear,’ Hailey announces, as if it’s the most natural thing in the world. ‘I don’t want to sit around in that damp gear for hours. You suit yourself.’ And the sound of her dressing, or undressing, continues.

Jean freezes. It is common sense. That’s the infuriating thing. She is surprised she didn’t think of it herself. But her common sense went right out the window some time ago, it seems.

‘Damn you Hailey Yarner.’ She pushes herself to her feet and snaps the blanket tight around her. 

‘You just suit yourself Jean McBrian,’ comes the singsong reply as Jean picks up her pile of outer clothes and turns away.

‘And don’t you dare look.’ Jean tries to sound her most terrifying but all she gets in response is a chuckle.

…

 

There is one last slug of bourbon left in the bottle. After they have packed everything else back in the car, Hailey offers it to Jean.

‘Admit it, you like the stuff.’

Jean tilts the bottle experimentally. She looks around at the tiny cove with the dull remains of their fire, the black water. She feels the wind insinuating under her coat and skirt, reminding her of her strange, semi-dressed state. She looks at the young woman beside her who is still watching her with so much interest and attention. She feels unleashed and untethered in a way that she hasn’t maybe since the war. She lifts the bottle and swallows the last deep golden mouthful.

‘It’s a bit rough around the edges.’ 

Hailey gives her a sharp dig with her elbow. Jean takes her hand in response, rubbing her thumb over her knuckles with a tenderness that belies the brisk tone of her words. 

‘But it’ll do.’

**Author's Note:**

> This is the first time I have written in too long, but I am IN LOVE with the new series and prepared to multi-ship the hell out of it.


End file.
